


A Handful Of Memories

by SapphyreLily



Series: Iwaizumi Week 2016 [5]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Angst, Body Modification, Character Death, Gen, M/M, Mpreg, POV Second Person, Some Fluff, in the middle it's just normal angst, okay guys relax, the chara death is only at the end ok
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-07
Updated: 2016-07-07
Packaged: 2018-07-21 22:45:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,782
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7408225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SapphyreLily/pseuds/SapphyreLily
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Iwaizumi Week Day 5 - Memorable Quotes</p><p>Life isn't something easily or simply defined. But there are some events you can't help but remember, some events you want to immortalise for fear of forgetting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Handful Of Memories

**Author's Note:**

> Looking back, I think I definitely misinterpreted the quote. _Again._ I'm sorry.

_You never realise how much you miss something until it’s gone._

x.x.x.x.x

_i. “Tooru”_

You were five years old when they took you out of the Nursery and gave you your own living space. It was a small cube-shaped room with a bed and dresser, plus a little table and chair for you to do your work.

You never knew your parents, the same as everyone else in the Society, but you did know the faces of the other boys and girls you grew up with.

Then they were no more, when the Society said you were old enough to learn independence and how to take care of yourself.

You liked your living space. It was plain, but you could tell the walls to change colours, and the clothes you found in your dresser were always clean and fresh. You had no bathroom to yourself, but that was okay, because every time you went to the toilet, you were sure to meet someone. Meeting people reminded you that you weren’t alone all the time, and that was good, because you liked being alone, but you didn’t like being _lonely_.

One day, you ran into a little boy who looked your age, his face red and splotchy, tears and snot crusted on his face. You told him he looked gross, and he started crying again.

That’s when you noticed the wet patch on the front of his pants, and understood.

You took his hand and pulled him to the sinks, washing his face and hands for him. Then you made him take you back to his living space, changed his sheets and grabbed him fresh clothes.

It was your first time washing someone else’s back, but you found you didn’t mind. The shy, thankful smile he offered you after the bath made your efforts worth it.

You were inseparable after that, and since your living space was only two doors down from his, the two of you spent nights over without a second thought, huddling under the blankets for warmth.

It was comfortable, to sleep beside a warm body.

His name was Tooru, and he scratched his kanji into the side of your dresser with a piece of broken rock he found one day. You took that rock and did the same for him, your shaky _Hajime_ standing out against the white.

The words were gone the next day, and you were both given two shocks with the electric stick, but you would do it all again without a second thought.

_ii. “Oikawa”_

You were ten when they upgraded you, shifted you to a new living space, one larger than your old one and with more furniture. You got a hole in the wall that spat out any material you wanted, and you spent hours tinkering with acrylic and metal until you made a little wind-up toy.

Your old neighbour from two doors down was now your next door neighbour, and they told you that you couldn’t sleep over any more. The two of you did it anyway, and got so many shocks for it that you were sure your brains were fried.

Another change was the things you learnt, more hands-on skills and stuff that actually made your brain _work_. And because you had to work eventually, they said, you were given a second name, a working name, a name that was for others – _strangers_ – to call you by. Your first name – your secret, childhood name – was yours and yours alone, and you weren’t allowed to share it with just anyone because _names held power_.

You told your neighbour your new name, and learnt his.

This time, the two of you painted the kanji onto each other’s arms, your working and child names together, and laughed at how the paint ran.

Your wall privileges were revoked for a week for that, and your hands were itchy, itching for a new project, but all you could do was twiddle your thumbs and trace the path where his kanji were burnt into your skin.

Turns out, the paint was one of those types with nano-bots – the _permanent_ type – and they had burrowed under your skin and his to stain them black forever.

From that day forth, every time you took off your shirt to change, the words _Oikawa Tooru_ rippled on your left arm, and people always asked _why._

You always made up some dumb story, and he did too, but then your eyes would meet across the room and you would grin, the shared secret buoyant in your heart.

_iii. “Iwa-chan, are you my mom?”_

The two of you were inseparable, but your interests had to split _somewhere_. You loved mechanics, tinkering with parts and putting stuff together. He loved programming, stitching codes together and twisting the purpose of an electronic device into something else. He could make anything that ran on code bend to his will, gently nudging it here and there until it reached perfection.

Your interests were something you two never agreed on, but together, you built a working robot for the first time.

A few more upgrades and improvements later, the two of you had a helper robot that picked up your laundry and neatened up your living space, and you smiled so much you thought your face broke.

The problem with him was that he was always pushing himself, forgetting to eat or sleep when he was close to completing a new code or when he was working on something new. He wanted to be the best, to be acknowledged for his skill and work. But he forgot he was still human, and the number of times you had to drag him away from his codes were too numerous to count, the amount of times you had to force eye drops into his dry, red eyes too irritating to keep track of.

One day he asked you something in jest, mentioning a taboo word.

You socked him first, then silenced the transmission of the microphone and camera in your room and hissed your annoyance at him.

He laughed but didn’t bring it up again.

After that, it became a running joke between you two. You ended up making a helper android to scold and take care of him, programmed with your voice and words. You had to write your own coding for it, and while he berated you for it afterwards – _I can write my_ own _coding, Iwa-chan_ – he also mentioned that he felt a lot better with the bot reminding him to live like a human.

_iv. “We are stronger together”_

Sometimes, your best friend worked himself to almost-death, and you had to physically be there to knock sense into him. He liked to take the entirety of the workload on himself, forgetting – or not quite trusting – your teammates.

When you caught him squinting at the screen, his eyes slits in his face, you head-butted him so hard he got a nosebleed.

 _We are stronger together_ , you promised. Reminded. _Nobody works alone on a project meant for four. Do you not trust us? We have our own strengths, but they are multiplied when we are together._

He had laughed, cried, but ultimately agreed.

Your joint project got the highest marks in ten years.

_v. “Idiotkawa”_

The day came where you graduated and got your placement. You got Mechanics. Matsukawa got Journalism. Hanamaki, Healthcare.

Your best friend ran when asked his placement, and when you returned and broke into his apartment, it was empty.

No hologram, no message, no explanation.

You were angry. Oh, so angry.

Your only relief was that the helper android was gone too, so maybe Oikawa cared about his life enough to bring it along to remind him.

_vi. “I am here”_

You thought you would never see him again. You never found out his designation, and he never sent a message. But by some stroke of luck, his helper android – the android _you_ built – came into your workshop for repair, three years after your graduation.

You tracked his coordinates, found his particulars in a hospital two towns away. Checked up the records, only to find that he was in the maternity ward.

You called Hanamaki, got him to track down every single piece of information about him while you hacked into his android for answers.

You didn’t want to know. You were too scared to face the truth. You played the memory card from beginning till end, with no breaks in between.

You were scared, but now you were impossibly _furious._

_vii. “I’m sorry”_

The memory card played back hundreds of videos, each one detailing a part of your lost three years. Once a day, he would speak in a video log, making a recording, but others were of him sitting in his new apartment, playing games, reading articles, coding programs or sleeping in weird positions. Very normal, day to day things.

Most people wouldn’t have noticed, but from the first video you saw his puffy eyes, his dark circles. The way he walked with a slow lethargy, the vibrant spring in his step gone. The way he was bent over, arms wrapped around his stomach protectively.

You thought the Society had been a perfectly good place to live and work, but now you took it all back.

In one of his videos, he spelled out in detail what they had done to him.

Breeders, he explained, were chosen for their looks first, and the quality of their reproductive cells next. After that, if they were physically fit, they were put through a massive surgery to ensure they could carry a child to term.

(Somewhere in the back of your mind, you recalled how little females were born, and how most of them were infertile. It was no wonder that these horrors were being inflicted on the males.)

This was the worst part for males, your friend explained. They had to find a woman with compatible DNA, clone her uterus and stick it in the man. The male was then put on a million and one drugs to prevent rejection of the tissue, and by the time the tissue took, the male was almost hopelessly addicted to the drugs.

Watching your best friend’s emaciated silhouette, you felt sick. You knew that the procedure had been done to him, and that his body had accepted the tissue.

You didn’t dare to watch the rest of the videos.

Your finger hit _Play._

His colouring got better as time passed. Healthier. He gained back his lost weight, and his hair regained its bright shine. But his expression grew sadder.

Many times, he started a video with _Iwa-chan, where are you? Come save me._ And your heart clenched whenever you saw that, because you never looked for him, never wondered where he went or why he left you behind. You had been too angry.

He gradually started sitting further away from the camera, showing off the bump between his hipbones. His face was drawn, exhausted, but it was lit with a child-like glee.

_I can feel it growing. It’s a miracle._

He’d whispered that, but all you could do was shake your head, because that wasn’t even _his_ child. He was just a surrogate, a body for the foetus to grow in. The foetus that was an embryo they implanted in him, one of those frozen ones from before the world collapsed and the Society was established.

The videos got longer, with him babbling on and on about the changes to his body, the drugs he had to take, the way he felt inexplicable fondness towards the new life growing in him. He almost seemed _happy_ , distracted from his pain by the little miracle that was happening in him.

In a video dated four months later, he was pale and sickly again.

He lifted up his shirt to show the lines of scarring, bright pink and barely healed.

 _A miscarriage_ , he whispered, eyes haunted. _My body rejected the tissue._

You wanted to reach through the screen and hug him, comfort him like you had when you were children, but you were three years too late.

x.x.x.x.x

He got worse. Sleeping all the time, barely eating, hardly ever leaving his room. You were tormented, and watching each of these videos tore at your composure.

Then one day, in the middle of a sleeping video, the door to his apartment was flung open.

A male with silver hair barged in, wielding a tray of food. He proceeded to wake your friend by tossing him off the bed, and you winced when you remembered the shape of the bruises that would form.

The silver-haired man was relentless in his assault, bundling your friend up in blankets and force feeding him. You decided then that you quite liked this guy.

It wasn’t until your friend was tucked in the man's arms crying that you noticed his odd body shape, his ballooning stomach straining against his baggy shirt.

You gaped at what it meant. His _body didn’t reject the foetus. It’s nearly fully grown._

The video ended.

 _viii. “I_ will _survive”_

The videos after that showed your best friend getting better under the eye of the silver-haired man. Until one day he was alone again, his face pale and tight.

_Suga-chan's having the baby._

You both waited in anxious anticipation.

He went to visit Suga, the little android tucked first under his arm, then set on the table to record.

The child wasn’t with him.

A doctor came in and explained to the distraught duo that the children were raised together in the Nursery – and you remembered then that yes, that _was_ where you first came from. It all made sense now.

But Suga cried and begged and scolded the doctor – _one chance, give me one chance to hold the child I carried for nine months_ – until the man with kind eyes relented.

You watched the three of them bent over the babe, cooing and smiling at it – no, _him._ Another male, another sacrifice for the Society.

You quickly quashed the thought.

Suga kissed the child on his brow, then pushed him into the doctor’s arms. _Take him away, quickly, before I do something I will regret._

The doctor bowed, repeating the ceremonial words as he left.

_The Society thanks you for your contribution._

x.x.x.x.x

In his next video, your best friend decided that he wouldn’t cry anymore.

 _I don’t_ want _to be a Breeder_ , he told the camera seriously. _But if I refuse, they’ll kill me._

_The babies are innocent. It’s not their fault that we are the ones housing them till birth. I don’t want to be used, but I want to feel what Suga-chan experienced. Creating new life is precious and sacred, so I want to carry a child to full term. But not for them._

_For myself._

_ix. “Because you believed in me”_

The remaining videos grew lengthier, but were dated far apart. In each one, your best friend looked healthier, stronger. The light of defiance and competitiveness returned to his eyes.

_I am a lot better now. I know you would want me to fight back but not overwork myself, so that’s what I’m doing._

_Tomorrow, I visit the doctors. They think it’s time to try again._

You watched him recover from the second transplantation surgery. Saw his relief when the tissue was not rejected. He underwent the implantation process several times before the embryo took, and his joy when he was found pregnant made you sick with mixed happiness and apprehension.

He made it to the second trimester this time before his body rejected the baby.

The crying was worse, but the recovery time was shorter.

 _I_ will _be strong. I_ will _survive. I will come back and find you, Iwa-chan, and then you’ll be in so much trouble for not trying to find me._

The date of the video was now two years after your graduation.

x.x.x.x.x

He hardly took the android out of his apartment for fear of discovery. Every video he made was either alone or with Suga, Suga who was pregnant again, whose body was oddly compatible despite being male.

He stuck to his word; he trained hard and studied harder, preparing himself for the paperwork to be passed a third time. Watching his diligence, you wished that he would see what a maniacal idea this was. There were reasons why females were the ones that bore children and not males.

One day, he came back giddy, flushed with the weight of a secret.

_We got fresh eggs and sperm in the labs today. The doctors said that if we can induce fertilisation, the embryos we fertilised would belong to us to carry to term. Guess who, guess who I got?_

He held up a snapshot of the name on the test tube labelled ‘Ova’. _This one’s from an Oikawa Minami. I heard that people with the same working names are related, so if that’s my sister, then the foetus would be more compatible with my body._

He set the picture of the tube down and held up another, flashing its name at the screen gleefully. _This one! I’m so lucky. It nearly went to Kunimi-kun, but Doctor Sawamura gave it to me!_

He beamed with happiness, then shut off the video to return to the lab to begin his new project.

You stared at the screen in shock, watching the next video buffer.

You should have known it might happen. The chances were slim, impossibly so, but the probability was still in the positive range.

You had needed the money, so you went for a donation drive and gave them what they wanted. They had paid you handsomely for it.

You were seized by a sudden desperation, and clicked ‘Play’ before the next video had finished loading.

_x. “This is what I’ve been waiting for”_

The videos got shorter, more succinct. Each one detailed his work in the lab and how successful he was with the in vitro fertilisation. He was jubilant in each one, so when you started a new video and saw how haggard he was, shock was your only reaction.

_Doctor Sawamura said that this is my last chance. If my body rejects the tissue this time, I can’t try again, because it would endanger my life. They’ll send me to work in Pleasure after this._

_I can’t do it. I can’t work in Pleasure, Iwa-chan. I’d rather die. I know you’d tell me to do what I can to survive, but I can’t._

_I can’t._

He had constant dark circles after that, even with Suga’s constant prompting for him to take care of himself. You wanted so badly to reach through the screen and punch him, but you couldn’t. All you could do was cheer Suga on as he did what was once your job.

x.x.x.x.x

In a video dated just ten months ago, the panicked look faded from his eyes.

_I did it. I have loads of successfully fertilised embryos now. Doctor Sawamura said we can start implantation tomorrow._

_My last chance. Wish me luck._

You couldn’t load the next video fast enough, desperation making your fingers slip on the keys. Finally, you got it loaded and set it to play.

He faced the camera, his face grave. He held up a stick that you knew well, after so many videos, and shuffled off to the toilet.

Two minutes later, a joyous screech assaulted your ears.

The android trundled off towards the bathroom, peeking in at him hugging the toilet bowl and laughing.

_It worked, it worked, it worked!_

_I’m pregnant!_

The android's automatic response to such overwhelming joy was a bleak **Shut up, Shittykawa** , but nothing could deter him now. He danced with abandon, only stopping when he almost fell.

He vowed to be a lot more careful so that another miscarriage wouldn’t happen.

_xi. “The two of us”_

The remainder of the videos didn’t say much. They documented his careful lifestyle, and how he took great measures to protect his stomach.

You watched his belly grow, ballooning outward and draining the life from him. He was thin and tired, but nothing made him happier than the movement from within him. He spoke to the unborn child often, rubbing his swollen stomach fondly.

You were running out of videos, and you saw why. You saw how the video quality began disintegrating, how his words or features were shorted out by static. Each video had progressively worse quality, until the last one.

He had been speaking about the term of his pregnancy, about how it was almost time for him to give birth. He had just estimated the remaining days to be about five when the video screen turned black.

You groaned in frustration. _Of all times for the android to die–!_

You pounded the table a few times in frustration, then picked up your repair kit and got to work.

x.x.x.x.x

Hanamaki called you as you finished your work on the android. The software and parts were so outdated that you had to change them completely; luckily, you knew how to retain the essential parts of the robot's personality even though its body was completely different.

You had never heard Hanamaki sound so urgent in your life.

_“The baby's a few days early, that’s normal. But the doctor can’t do a Caesarean section because they don’t have enough blood on hand to keep him alive if it goes wrong. The scan shows that the umbilical cord is wrapped around the baby’s neck as well. They’re trapped, unless he can try giving birth the normal way. And even then, it’s dangerous.”_

Your voice was scratchy when you asked, _Does he even have an opening to give birth from?_

There was a pause. The dam broke.

Hanamaki laughed and laughed and laughed.

You didn’t think it was an appropriate reaction.

His giggles finally subsided, and he told you, _Of course._

More seriously, _He may not survive. The blood issue–_

_I'll come down._

Your voice was soft; quiet and determined. _Tell me where. He can have my blood._

 _Are you_ sure _you’re a universal donor?_

_JUST TELL ME WHERE!_

His voice was quiet. You could almost see him stilling on the other end of the line.

Two minutes later, you ran out for a hovercar, android tucked under your arm.

The alarms blared when you left your workshop prematurely, but you couldn’t care less.

You were three years too late, and you refused to be a minute later.

_xii. “Home isn’t a place; it’s a person”_

The medics at the hospital frowned at your angry entrance, but their faces cleared when you told them who you were there for. Hanamaki must have called ahead.

You were ushered into a stall and forced to shower, dressed in hospital scrubs before they let you into the delivery ward.

You refused to let go of the android, and they reluctantly allowed you to bring it in.

Your entry was not grand, but it felt like it. You didn’t see him at first, slumped against the pillows as he was. What you first saw was the shock of silver hair by the bedside, his hand grasping another.

Suga straightened up at your intrusion, his brow furrowing.

_Suga-chan…?_

His gaze followed the silver-haired man’s, the loudest gasp escaping him. _I’m dreaming. I must be dreaming. Are you_ sure _epidurals don’t cause hallucinations?_

_Oikawa… I can see him too, you know._

Tooru. You weren’t sure you said it aloud, but he gasped again at the sound of your voice. _Tooru._

_Hajime._

And then you were at his bedside, android on the floor somewhere behind you, arms around his neck, and the two of you were laughing, crying, holding on tightly, so tightly, you knew that you would bruise the next day.

Suddenly, he stopped. Pushed you away. Tore desperately at your left sleeve. Something clicked, and you pulled your sleeve up for him, baring the clumsy kanji tattooed into your arm.

_Relax. It’s me._

He did.

His tense posture loosened, but his fingers traced the words in wonder, as if he had not seen them before. He started to say something, but the breath caught in his throat. His fingernails dug into your bicep as he breathed heavily, face white. You looked up in confusion, wondering what the accelerated beeping was.

 _It’s a contraction._ Suga told you, pointing to the monitor. _They will come faster and closer to each other when the baby is ready to come out._

 _Ah._ You couldn’t say much.

The silver-haired man looked at you curiously. _Why_ are _you here?_

You jolted back to reality with those words. Looking down at your best friend, whose death grip on your arm had lessened, you addressed the surgeon.

_I came to donate my blood, so that he can have the Caesarean._

_xiii. “Don’t ever leave me”_

The surgeons made you and Suga sit in a corner of the operating theatre while they performed the surgery. You were woozy from all the blood they took, but managed to stay awake.

Suga looked at you sideways and offered a small smile.

You remembered then that you were never properly introduced.

So while your best friend underwent possibly the last surgery of his life, you were introduced to your stand-in for the past three years.

x.x.x.x.x

_You are lucky your blood is universal._

You stopped trying to glare your coffee cup to death. _Even if it wasn’t, I would have come._

 _That’s true._ Hanamaki sat next to you, slumping back in the chair. _How is the baby?_

_She’s all right._

You think about the little girl, the tiny bundle that lay wrapped in Tooru's arms for all of ten minutes before she was whisked away forever. The tiny bundle that had your eyebrows and scrunched up nose, but had Tooru's fluffy curls. Her eyes had fluttered briefly during those final moments, but did not open. You would never know if her irises would be forest green or chocolate brown.

_I still can’t believe she’s mine._

_She belongs to the Society now._

You knew Hanamaki wasn’t being harsh. It was a fact, something that everyone in the Society knew, something that couldn’t be changed. You didn’t like the system – hated it, even, after finding out about the Breeders – but you knew it had its merits. Without it, a lot of things would have been different. A lot of things would never have happened.

You wondered if you would have met everyone you ever cared for if you hadn’t been forcefully separated from your surrogate mother at birth.

_I know._

There were a few minutes of uncharacteristic silence before you glanced over, thinking that perhaps, Hanamaki _had_ fallen asleep. Medics weren’t known for getting a lot of shut-eye.

Slanted brown eyes looked back at you, and you raised an eyebrow to hide your surprise.

He stood suddenly, plucked the cup from your hands and tossed it in the trash.

_Come on, let’s go find Oikawa._

x.x.x.x.x

The brunet was quietly talking to Suga when the two of you walked in. His eyes lit up and his arms stretched out, a smile playing at his lips. _Makki! Hug!_

Hanamaki laughed but obliged.

You saw the android sitting on the table, its unblinking eyes showing that it was recording. You smiled wryly, going over to pet it and thank it for showing you the way back to him. It didn’t respond because it was busy, but its mechanical arms fidgeted as if it wanted to clap.

_Iwa-chan._

You were alone with him. You wondered when and how the others had disappeared. Surely you hadn’t been staring at the android for that long?

You sat on the bed and he took your hand, tracing the callouses and the stains of nano-grease. The atmosphere was suddenly sombre, tension lying thick on your shoulders. He didn’t look up as he asked, _Why didn't you come find me?_

_I was angry._

He snorted, the sound fond and exasperated. _You’re always angry_.

Your hand moved of its own accord, cupping his face and wiping the clear stream of tears away. _I’m only ever angry at you._

He pulled your hand away, so that now both of yours were clasped in his. _Meanie._

You head-butted him gently. _You’re an ass._

You’re _being too nice._

_I missed you._

He was stunned into silence, as were you. You couldn’t believe you said it out loud.

Eventually his words started up again, stuttering and embarrassed. _I– I–_ He looked down. _You should hate me._

 _I already did that._ You leaned forward, dropped your forehead onto his shoulder and felt him jump. _Three years of it._

He sniffled and dropped his head on your shoulder in turn. _I’m a horrible person. You shouldn’t talk to me anymore._

_And lose you again? Never._

His fingers uncurled from around yours only to find a new place in the hospital scrubs you were still wearing. You could feel the hot tears staining your shoulder, the trembling that shook his skinny frame like a leaf in the wind. _Iwa-chan is so sappy._

Your hand cradled the back of his head, fingers carding through the soft locks. You didn’t know what it was, this feeling that made you angry and sad and jubilant at him, for him, with him. This emotion that got you tied up in knots and had you stumbling, chasing after him and tripping over nothing. You had never wondered what it was that tied the two of you together, that made you put up with his idiotic tendencies and steer him gently back to the path of normalcy.

You had never wondered before, what this feeling was, this feeling that tore your heart to shreds when he left without a word. This feeling that made you want to hold him close and protect him, but also to set him free and watch as he soared and shone brightly, brightly upon your bleak existence.

It had been three years since he left you, and now that you had him back, you were willing to admit that maybe, you needed him more than he needed you, after all. And that maybe, maybe…

You could forgive him, because you were back together, and he didn’t want to let go either.

_Tooru, I think I love you._

His minute shaking stopped, only to come back full-force, but this time, with the most choked sound you had ever heard.

It took you too long to realise that he was laughing _and_ crying _._

_Iwa-chan, Iwa-chan, Iwa-chan._

_You’re_ so _sappy._

_I love you, I love you, I love you too._

_Don’t leave me, don’t ever leave me again._

You held him close and breathed in his scent, diluted by the drugs and antiseptic.

_I won’t. I promise._

You heard an alarm go off somewhere close by, and the android recording interrupted itself to tell you that _They are coming._

But you didn’t care, you didn’t care because after a lifetime, you were finally holding your whole world in your arms, and _no one_ , not even the blasted Society, could make you let go again.

_Iwa-chan?_

You knew, that the punishment for not following the working hours was detention, possibly incarceration, and maybe death. But you also had records of rebelliousness, not conforming to the rules, and also for loving your best friend.

The Society did not tolerate individuals who did not fit in their mould, and you were at the top of that list.

_Iwa-chan, I think they’re here for me._

_Huh?_ You looked at him oddly, because you were sure it was you. You told him as much.

He shook his head and buried his face in your shirt, laugh-crying again.

_Maybe they’ll kill us both at once, you think?_

_That would be kind of them. It would be more cruel if one of us was to live and the other died._

He looked at you with dark amusement, nodding thoughtfully.

_Maybe… What if we both left, then? Before they get here?_

_…what do you want to do?_

_xiv. “Fools”_

They were wrong. But also right.

The Society did intend to kill one of them that day, and work the other to death as an example.

But they overdosed themselves on morphine before they reached them, and no medic could reverse the damage in time.

I had been writing an article that would expose the Society’s worst aspects, and it went viral just after the two could not be revived. Life broke down everywhere after the dark deeds were exposed, and it was absolute chaos.

Five hundred days later, they finally gave in and adjusted some aspects of life for us. We could choose parts of our lives, but some parts, like the Nursery, would stay.

But now, we could live together with others, and have a child live with us once they passed Nursery age.

Takahiro had contacts. I don’t know how many strings he pulled, but by the time she was five years old, Maru-chan was living with us.

Sometimes, I wonder which official named her, which rebellious, or unknowing soul named her after the joining of her fathers. The duo that started a revolution, even though they didn’t live to see it. The duo that caused so much trouble that the officials decided that they had to be culled. The duo that gave me and Takahiro the chance to see the sunrise today, with our little girl between us.

I wonder, sometimes, what her working name – her last name, her _family_ name – will be when she reaches ten. Will she be given my name? Takahiro's? Or will she be crowned with the name of one of the two revolutionaries, Oikawa or Iwaizumi?

But if there’s one thing that their insubordination taught us, if there’s one thing that we had to do, to remember, to protect and to fight for–

_Home. Family. The ones you trust and love._

Their faces are drawn and tired, but they are smiling at the screen, arms around each other, eyes bright and _alive._

_We can’t be the first to realise this. They must know that. That we are stronger with someone to support us. That by relying on someone every once in a while, you fix the holes in your armour, strengthen your foundation, patch up the cracks where you have fallen before._

_Always fight. Fight for what you believe in. For what you love and trust._

_We all have something we believe in. What’s yours?_

**Author's Note:**

> "Maru" means circle. When I wrote this, I took the interpretation of "Tooru" to mean "end" (some fics and doujins write it this way, but Tooru does not actually mean end, btw). In this way, "Hajime" ("beginning") and "Tooru" together would be "forever", "infinite", "never-ending". A circle represents that, and that's why their little girl is named that way.
> 
> Is that too deep?


End file.
